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Nanocrystals sometimes adopt unusual crystal structure configurations in order to maintain structural stability with increasingly large surface-to-volume ratios. The understanding of these transformations is of great scientific interest and represents an opportunity to achieve beneficial materials properties resulting from different crystal arrangements. Here, the phase transformation from α to β phases of tin (Sn) nanocrystals is investigated in nanocrystals with diameters ranging from 6.1 to 1.6 nm. Ultra-small Sn nanocrystals are achieved through our highly non-equilibrium plasma process operated at atmospheric pressures. Larger nanocrystals adopt the β-Sn tetragonal structure, while smaller nanocrystals show stability with the α-Sn diamond cubic structure. Synthesis at other conditions produce nanocrystals with mean diameters within the range 2-3 nm, which exhibit mixed phases. This work represents an important contribution to understand structural stability at the nanoscale and the possibility of achieving phases of relevance for many applications.

Synthesis of AlPO-5 and SAPO-5 nanoparticles was followed by applying hydrothermal method to use them as adsorbents in the removal of Fe3+, Pb2+, and Cd2+ions.The synthesized products were characterized using powder X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope (SEM), FTIR and BET analysis. The adsorption isotherms and kinetics including Langmuir, Freundlich, pseudo-first order, pseudo-second order and intraparticle diffusion models have been employed. The experimental adsorption equilibrium and kinetic data nearly followed the Langmuir isotherm and pseudo-second order kinetic model, respectively. It was found that the existence of the bridging hydroxyl group in the SAPO-5 structure causes chemisorption of Fe3+, Pb2+, and Cd2+ions on SAPO-5 which have greatly improved the performance of this adsorbent against its low external surface area. Using AlPO-5 and SAPO-5 as novel adsorbents in heavy metal adsorption for the first time indicated the great potential of these adsorbents in removal of heavy metal ions from water.

Nucleation and growth of highly crystalline silicon nanoparticles in atmospheric-pressure lowtemperature microplasmas at gas temperatures well below the Si crystallization threshold and within a short (100 μs) period of time are demonstrated and explained. The modeling reveals that collisionenhanced ion fluxes can effectively increase the heat flux on the nanoparticle surface and this heating is controlled by the ion density. It is shown that nanoparticles can be heated to temperatures above the crystallization threshold. These combined experimental and theoretical results confirm the effective heating and structure control of Si nanoparticles at atmospheric pressure and low gas temperatures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Synthesis of SAPO-34 nanocrystals which has been recently considered as a challenging task was successfully performed by sonochemical method using TEAOH as structure directing agent (SDA). The products were characterized by XRD, SEM, EDX, BET and TGA. The average crystal size of the final product prepared sonochemically is 50nm that is much smaller than that of synthesized under hydrothermal condition and the morphology of the crystals changes from uniform spherical nanoparticles to spherical aggregates of cube type SAPO-34 crystals respectively. In the case of sample synthesized sonochemically with aid of hydrothermal condition, the surface area is significantly upper than that of obtained by the conventional static hydrothermal technology with almost the same crystallinity. SAPO-34 framework synthesized by just ultrasonic treatment is unstable and a significant part of SAPO-34 nanocrystals is transformed to the dense phase of AlPO4 structure, i.e., Cristobalite. Contrary to hydrothermal method that at least 24h of the synthesis time is required to obtain fully crystalline SAPO-34, sonochemical-assisted hydrothermal synthesis of samples leads to form fully crystalline SAPO-34 crystals taking only 1.5h. In a sonochemical process, a huge density of energy for crystallization is provided by the collapse of bubbles which formed by ultrasonic waves. The fact that small SONO-SAPO-34 crystals could be prepared by the sonochemical method suggests a high nucleation density in the early stages of synthesis and slow crystal growth after nucleation. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In this paper we describe a novel method for delivering a precise, known amount of electric charge to a micron-sized solid target. Aerosolised microparticles passed through a plasma discharge will acquire significant electric charge. The fluid stability under evaporative stress is a key aspect that is core to the research. Initially stable charged aerosols subject to evaporation (i.e. a continually changing radius) may encounter the Rayleigh stability limit. This limit arises from the electrostatic and surface tension forces and determines the maximum charge a stable droplet can retain, as a function of radius. We demonstrate that even if the droplet charge is initially much less than the Rayleigh limit, the stability limit will be encountered as the droplet evaporates. The instability emission mechanism is strongly linked to the final charge deposited on the target, providing a mechanism that can be used to ensure a predictable charge deposit on a known encapsulated microparticle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]